Page 52 of Absolution

Fourteen

*New York*

Christian

It’s all too familiar. The sharp smell of antiseptics, the low beeping from monitors, oxygen tickling my nose. I have no idea where I am, except that it’s obviously a hospital. I fucking hate hospitals! Every breath feels as if something squeezes my chest, as if something pushes back every time I inhale. An attempt at a deeper inhale makes me cough until I almost throw up.

“Mr. Russo. You’re finally awake.”

The voice is female with a slightly husky quality to it I recognize. It’s not her, but close. Too close.

“Kerry?”

“I’m Rhonda, I’m a nurse here at Mount Sinai.”

“How…” I open my eyes and take in the dark-skinned woman in her pink scrubs as I fight for a breath. “How long?”

“You’ve been here a little over three weeks.”

“What? That’s not…” I gasp, “possible.”

“I’ll go get the doctor. They’ll be happy to know you’re with us again.”

I grip her arm, shocked at how weak I am, much much weaker than I was after being shot a couple of years back. “Nathan. Get me Nathan.”

“Your brother?”

I nod.

“Will do, Mr. Russo.”

The door whispers shut behind her and I’m left alone. I try to feel my body, feel what’s left of me. I wiggle my toes and then lift a leg experimentally. It falls back, heavy as lead.

Kerry. Cecilia.

With the images of them everything else comes rushing back, the water, the numbing cold. Panic claws at my chest as my heart speeds up, tightening it impossibly, choking me.

The doctor is tall, his thick salt and pepper hair neatly combed back. He’s got an impressive tan in the middle of winter and something about him screams avid golfer. He looks slick, superior. I dislike him immediately.

He drones on and on about the state I’m in, the state I’ve been in, what they’ve done, but I zone out.

“Did you get hold of my brother?”

The doc snaps his mouth shut and throws an annoyed glance at Rhonda as she darts to my side. “He’s on his way here, Mr. Russo.”

I close my eyes. “Good. Leave me alone, please.”

“Bro.”

“Where the fuck were you?” I grit out.

“Aww. Got lonely? Me and Ang have taken turns sitting here, watching you sleep. It’s boring as fuck.”

“Angela’s been here?”

“Of course, she’s been glued to your side, dude, but she’s got classes and shit she’s gotta attend, or she’ll lose her position.”

“Kerry? Cecilia?”

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